Tuesday, February 01, 2011

They never learn

While the current upheaval in Egypt cannot be traced to recent assaults on the Copts there, the safety of this ancient Christian community, which played a major role in the country’s cultural life centuries before Islam (and almost two millennia before Mohammad el-Baradei), would be one important test of whether post-Mubarak Egypt has moved beyond one of the little-remarked but nonetheless odious aspects of Mubarak’s rule: namely, his appeasement of those Muslims who insist that there is no room in their country’s culture or public life for Coptic Christianity or indeed any other form of Christianity.

The Holy See’s opposition to the use of force in Iraq in March 2003 is well known. Perhaps less well known is the widespread conviction in the Vatican today that a precipitous American withdrawal from Iraq would be the worst possible option from every point of view, including that of morality. Senior officials of the Holy See with whom I discussed the issue in May share the view of American analysts who are convinced that a premature American disengagement from Iraq would lead to genocidal violence, Iraq’s collapse into a failed state, chaos throughout the Middle East, and a new haven for international terrorists. That all of this would make life intolerable for Iraq’s remaining Christians is pluperfectly obvious.

Note: Weigel was a strident advocate of the Iraq invasion, from a moral perspective, in 2002-03.

How's that approach of getting rid of the undesirable Arab strongman first and worrying about the Christians later working out in Iraq?